applause and the pathetique symphony

David Stabler has an excellent post on his blog concerning the early applause after the last movement of the Pathetique symphony of Tchaikovsky. He exchanged emails with music director Carlos Kalmar about the applause, and Carlos had some interesting thoughts on the conductor’s role in encouraging/discouraging applause:

Personally the premature applause isn’t an issue. Of course it was five seconds early, but I believe that there is nothing really important to talk about when only one or two members in an audience of more than 2000 clap before it’s really over. On Saturday I felt that the tension in the entire audience was very high. They were concentrated and alert. One clapped. Enthusiastically. No big deal. Monday – silence in the Schnitz after the Pathetique was over, and after I relaxed quietly. The feeling for everybody was nice of course. But all in all I do not want to take command of the crowd in terms of telling them when it is appropriate to applaud. They do very well.